SteveFromNY

So I really got into biking, found out about cyclocross, and ended up buying a bikesdirect cross bike. I flipped it (too small) and built up a Specialized tricross frame from scratch with Ultegra everything and other awesome parts.

I found no cross events near me, and never took it even remotely off road & ended up using it strictly for road (I still have brand new cross knobbies at home, never mounted). However, I seriously love this bike (it's so damn comfortable), and even though I ended up buying a new road bike, I'm thinking about just keeping it.

Anybody else thought they'd get into the sport, but wound up not like me?

Here she is btw. I know, too clean to be in this forum.

IthaDan 

That's an awesome looking bike. I have one I've never taken off dirt roads. It's take more of a commuter/tourer tack, but some of my best strava times were riding it with 23mm tires. I guess it just fits right.

SteveFromNY

thanks! I feel kinda stupid not taking it off road..but truth is I got excited about the sport, but just got into road riding instead. the high bottom bracket and geometry make it ideal for riding in the city. what bike do you have?

starjag

I plan to do something like this eventually. Maybe with a Cannondale CAADX Disc or a Focus Mares CX 2.0 Disc as foundation.

FMB42

Well, I did a track bike frame build and have never used it on a track. Haven't done much pavement riding on it either. Ended up using it for very short course off-road use on relatively smooth and level terrain (while running Kenda Kommando 32s). I do eventually plan on getting a set of road tires. But for now I'm having too much "off-road" fun with it. Go figure...

I still feel kinda silly about the direction I took with the build. The thing was that I changed my mind about what I wanted to use it for during the (long) process of piecing the darn bike together.

fietsbob

IMO, They are now filling the niche that 27"x1.25" wheel bikes used to ,

back before the roadies went to high Tech, and 23mm wide tires,

now they too get the high tech shifting stuff too, and Prices to match.

but you did want to show off pictures of your bike, its nice..

actual CX Racers seem to be a small sub-set, given the volume of commuters, touring, and Cross-hybrid posters
using the various makers models of these Types .

its like trying to catagorize Music recordings that blend several Genre , what bin do you put it in?

I have a Cross bike, a Pinarello, steel, and RB1 both set up like a tourer : triple crank..
both are red ..

Most of my miles is on bikes with mudguards and a Bag to carry stuff in , not those.

Andy_K 

My commuter is nominally a CX bike (entry-level Kona Jake). It will likely never see off-road use, and I do use it as my road bike on rainy days. I have an older Jake and used to have a Cross Check that each got used as my fair weather road bike for a while, but I also used both of them off road at other times. Now I've got two "pure" road bikes. The ability to put fat tires on the CX bikes makes them a nice option for rides with bad pavement, but there's something about railing a corner on a road bike that just feels right.

That TriCross looks pretty sweet, but you really should break out the knobbies and let it live the dream. You might have to drive an hour or so to get to a CX race, but it's worth the effort.

GregTR

My commuter/road bike is a BD Fantom Cross Ti with Parabox R hydraulic disc brakes. I'm running 700x32 slicks on the thing and it'll never go off-road. The reason I got a cross bike was the disc brake option and the fact that I could mount up decent width road tires with fenders.

idc

I got a cross bike planning to use it for lots of things! So far I have used it primarily for weekend gravel grinders (40-80mi), but also for commuting (usually my 3rd or 4th choice, but ideal in certain conditions as it's my only non-MTB with disc brakes) and CX races (only 2 so far). I plan to use it for towing my kids/utility stuff in the warmer months as well since it also has rack mounts.

With a good disc hub road wheelset and some lighter component swap outs I could maybe get it as roadie-worthy as my road bike. The gearing is close enough for my purposes already, I've never really spun out my 50-11, and I actually prefer the 46T for commuting.

stevage

Ha, that looks so weird. I have the same frame - until I ran into a car, rebuilt it, and now my girlfriend rides it. Now I have the next year's model.

This summer I got into road riding, doing a 200km mountain-climbing audax. So I put road wheels, tyres and cassette on it for training, doing about 3500km. What's great is I can flip it between a cross/touring bike and a road bike just by swapping the wheels. I was amazed what a difference lighter wheels/tyres made - even though I bought the absolute cheapest road wheels I could find (Shimano R501 - $120 the pair!)

I can see the appeal of keeping it just as a road bike, but it also seems a little odd to me to spend so much on the wheels etc, with a fairly low end alloy frame. If you take it off-road now though, you'll hate yourself for getting dirt and mud into the shifter housings...